


Blame

by Corvid_Knight



Series: Demonstuck [3]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Demonstuck, Gen, Offscreen character death, can't think of anything else to tag but if i missed a trigger hmu in the comments, character in shock, this is very much a vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2021-01-25 12:27:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21356248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corvid_Knight/pseuds/Corvid_Knight
Summary: "It's all right. We're done. It's over. I'm sorry." You are. You really are. You can handle the times when a hunter comes back beyond the help you can give—you've had more barely-not-children die clutching at your hand than you want to count. This is worse, sometimes—struggling to help the ones who couldn't save their friends or their family, and knowing that you're never going to be able to really fix them.D and Bro come home from a hunt and instantly cause a headache for the safehouse's current resident doctor.
Series: Demonstuck [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1003470
Comments: 12
Kudos: 119





	Blame

The brothers are a constant source of work for you, whether it's patching them up after a hunt or just cleaning up the aftermath of fistfights with other hunters who think they can take a pair of probably-not-straight boys who won't draw weapons on safe ground. Contrary to your general experience, the two of them manage to rack up more visits to the med room than all of the actual children here put together—and yes, you're including their two in that even if you're not sure whether Dave and Dirk are just two more siblings or actual biological children of one of the elder Striders. Not that it matters; you're one hundred percent sure that they all share genes one way or another. 

Still, even with all the time you spend patching them up, you have to admit they're decent patients. Neither of them can be that far out of their teens, but they don't really show that stubborn _I know better than a doctor_ mindset that makes treating younger hunters (or hunters who've been on their own since they _were_ young) so enormously frustrating. Maybe it helps that there's rarely anything serious, though—training injuries, bruises and scrapes and pulled muscles are usually the worst of it. The two times the younger one's come in with gunshot wounds are outliers, caused completely by Bro's horrible habit of just tackling any demon who thinks it's a good idea to try and use the hunters' weapons against them. Still, he's always sat more still and quiet than anyone who's in the process of having a hold in his arm cleaned out should really be able to, and he's never come back with ripped-out stitches. 

But, see. All those were hunts that went _well._ Tonight's...not so much. 

They both come in under their own power, which throws you off—doors slam between the entrance and the room you've spent months converting into something that's a bastard child of a school nurse's headquarters and a fully operational emergency room. (You're just glad that you have more space to work with here than you did in the back of an ambulance. That was never fun.) Without even looking up from the manifest you're typing out you count how many doors you can hear shutting—it's only three this time, which means you're taken by surprise when _your_ door opens. 

This house isn't quite normal. You still haven't figured out how to make contact, but there's something here alongside the hunters who've renovated it and turned it into the safehouse it is—the wards can't keep it out because it's always been here, but something very alive and thinking inhabits the structure, warping space and arranging the rooms to aid or inconvenience as it pleases. This is a matter of aid, though; you know that for sure when the door to your little medical room slams open and then shut again, the younger Strider shoving the older one up against the door and pinning him there with both hands twisting up fistfuls of his shirt. 

"How fucking dare you, how _dare_ you—" 

"Strider!" 

"—how dare you try an' leave me—" 

All right, he obviously doesn't even realize which room you're in; you suspect he stopped here because it was the first room that didn't have someone obviously in it. Bro doesn't even glance at you as you jump to your feet, not until you seize his upper arm and yank hard enough that D's body jerks away from the door for a second. _Then_ he looks, cold amber eyes filled with fury that just barely makes it onto the rest of his face as he growls incoherently at you for a moment before he remembers how to use words. 

"Get the fuck out!" 

Well you're not doing _that._ Instead you meet his eyes for a moment before taking a look at the rest of his face—specifically the part that concerns you as a doctor, the half-dried blood dripping down past his eyebrow on the left side. You're willing to bet he doesn't even feel it, even if there's smears across the rest of his face and a matching stain on the sleeve of his shirt that suggests he's wiped it away at least a couple times on the way back from wherever it happened. 

He's not bleeding out, is what you're seeing here. D might actually be worse off even if you don't see a mark on him—when Bro let him go, he just slumped back against the support of the steady surface behind him, eyes shut and face screwed up into an expression of more than physical pain. You have multiple possible priorities here, and unfortunately you don't think that cleaning up the actual injuries here is going to be one of them. 

Separating these two, yes. You've got one hand clamped around Bro's bicep, which (going by the murderous look on his face) is roughly analogous to having a tiger by the tail—if you let go, you're not going to like the results. 

So you're not going to let go. Very simple. 

"Come in here and let me take care of your face," you tell him, keeping your voice low and calm enough that (you hope) it won't register as a threat to D. "Come on. Right now, come on." 

He glares at you. When he opens his mouth you tighten your grip on his arm until the joints of your fingers ache. 

"This is _not_ a choice, Strider." 

"Like _you_ could make me do anything," he bites out, and you have to restrain yourself from rolling your eyes as you reach over with your free hand to yank a drawer open and fish out what you need to convince him. 

"See this?" Those orange eyes focus on the syringe in your hand for a heartbeat, then flick to his still-unresponsive brother before coming back to settle on your face. "I _can_ and _will_ sedate you until this is dealt with." 

"You wouldn't fuckin' _dare_." 

"Try me." When he doesn't reply to that other than with a slightly more deadly glare, you pull at his arm again. "Come in here. _Now._" 

He actually growls at you. You've never had a human patient make that kind of noise before. But he doesn't resist as you gently nudge D out from in front of the door so you can open it and drag him out into the hall. 

Well, not the hall. It _should_ be the hall—your little store room's through the door opposite this one, or it should be, but apparently the house thinks this is a conversation you should have in private. You agree with it. 

Bro doesn't seem surprised that he's in a small room full of stacks of boxes instead of the expected emptiness of the hall, though. Then again, maybe he doesn't even notice—it's not like he takes his eyes off you. It's more unnerving than you would've thought it'd be; you don't think you've ever seen either of the brothers minus their shades for longer than it takes to check their eyes for signs of a concussion. 

Speaking of which. Despite the blood smeared across his face, he doesn't currently show any signs of a concussion. That's...something, at least. 

"He's going to do something stupid," he growls out at you as you close the door, keeping his voice low and on an edge of control that you're willing to bet is razor-thin. "It'll be on you if he—aw, _fuck_!" 

No, you didn't really _need_ to grab the back of his neck and force him into leaning down enough that you can get a look at the source of the blood on his face. You could have just asked him to do it, or even to sit down on one of the sturdier stacks of boxes, but at some point and with some people getting rough is the only real option. This is one of those times and Strider is _definitely_ that kind of person. "He's in _shock._ What happened?" 

"Fuck you." He jerks back and you let him go; it's not like the shallow cuts are going to kill him if you leave them alone. Hell, as long as he disinfects them at some point and they don't get infected, he might not even get a scar out of this. "D don't have a mark on him—" 

"That doesn't mean he's all right." Oh fuck. You're going to have to be the ER therapist again. You _hate_ doing that, for a whole host of reasons. "Tell me what happened." 

He scowls at you. "Shit went down." 

How helpful. "...and?" 

"He got people killed." 

"Do _not_ tell him that." Except he already did, you can read that in his face in the moment you snap at him. Dear gods, this man should not be allowed to work with a team of any sort. 

"He got 'em killed and he tried to fucking _follow_ them, asshole—" 

There's probably something in the Hippocratic oath that says you're not allowed to slap your patients. Then again, you're not totally sure that you actually went through swearing that specific oath, so there's not really anything to give you even a moment's hesitation here. The blow leaves your palm stinging, and you hope it hurts him worse even if the only reaction you get is his head rocking to the side with the force of it. 

"You need to calm down," you tell him, struggling to keep your eyes on his instead of looking at how you've started a new trickle of blood from the scratches—and that's what it has to be; D clawed at him at some point—across his temple. "You have no business being around your brother right now, if this is how you're going to react to his almost dying." 

He glares at you, and you see the way he tenses—telegraphing what he wants to do right now, what he might be about to try to do to you. At this point you really wish that you'd kept the syringe you threatened him with instead of putting it down on the table when you went to coax D into moving. Also that it actually had a sedative in it. Something fast-acting and powerful. Horse tranquilizer, maybe. 

For whatever reason, he ends up not hitting you. Just keeps eye contact as if that's the best way to intimidate you (which it might be, when you think about it) and finally growls, "You didn't see him. Trying to walk into the god damn fire." 

"No, I didn't, and somehow I _still_ know better than to tell him it's his fault when he's to hurt to even start to try to defend himself." 

"It _is_—he should've been on recon, not—" 

"I don't want to hear it." You hold up both hands, palms-out—a silent but very obvious _stop._ "Get out." 

"Not without D." 

"No. _Out._ You know he's not going to come to any more harm here." 

"He's _my_ bro," and later you'll think that the emphasis was wrong there, less relation and more ownership and you'll wonder, you'll wonder if he talks like that where D can hear, whether it's just his older brother that he uses that tone about or if it's anyone he's close to, anyone he claims any kind of relationship with—but just now all you're concerned with is holding your ground long enough to outlast him so you can get back to D and help him as well as you're going to be able to. "You don't get to just—" 

You point at the door and he stops talking. For another moment he just stares at you; then you say, "_Now_," and he spins on his heel to knock the door open with one hand—palm flat against the wood and it swings open, even though you'd swear the latch caught when you shut it. Before it swings shut you see the hall beyond, instead of your med room. 

As soon as it shuts you let out a long, slow breath that you probably shouldn't have been holding. "Thank you," you murmur to the empty room. "Do I need to wait a moment for you to get things straight again, or..." 

You don't expect an answer, but the house gives you one anyway—somewhere behind you, a box tips over. It's nothing breakable, and it doesn't come open on the way, but when you look back at the door it's swung half-open, giving you a clear view of D Strider sitting on the floor with his back against the wall and his knees pulled up to his chest. Even from across the room you can see he's not picked up any more injuries than he came in with—one small blessing in this whole clusterfuck. 

He doesn't move until you kneel down before him and touch his shoulder. Then he gasps in a shaky breath, flinching back as his eyes snap open. "Derrick—" 

Oh. You never knew what the younger brother's name was. "No. He's gone to—" Think of something. You're practiced enough at lying smoothly with no warning that there isn't even a pause he'll notice. "—check on the little ones." 

"Dave 'n Dirk." It comes out in a mumble as D shudders and closes his eyes again. "Derrick—Bro—god, he's gonna be pissed you know his name." 

"I won't use it." Be truthful. "Probably." 

"He'd kick your ass for it, y'know. Bein' the doc won't stop him." 

"I'll make sure I keep that in mind, don't worry." You'll also make sure that he never finds out D was the one who let it slip. "He wouldn't tell me what happened, only that he was...worried about you." 

He actually laughs at that. It's not a reassuring sound. "'Worried 'bout me.' He'd kill me himself if he could." 

All right, that's. Hm. You don't like that. It doesn't even matter if it's true or not; that D would say it is. Hm. Not great. "I don't think so. Here, come on." 

D's built like a sprinter, all height and thin enough that if you didn't recognize his body type you'd worry about him being underweight, but that doesn't mean he's not heavy enough to make you really struggle to get him on his feet. It gets a little easier when he realizes that he can't just keep being dead weight and starts helping, at least. He still doesn't open his eyes at all, but he lets you lead him to the cot in the corner instead of forcing you to drag him, and he sits when he's guided to sit. 

And for a moment, _all_ he does is sit, hands moving to grab at his elbows as if that's going to anchor or protect him. Then, "I got them killed." 

"D." 

"I—I killed them." 

"D, no, that's not—" 

"I _killed_ them." 

"D, you need to tell me what happned. Please." 

D opens his mouth to say something else, chokes out a sob instead, and jerks his hands up to cover his face. He sits like that for a moment, gasping in hysterical panting breaths, and you sit back on your heels and think about how he looks even younger now than however old he's told you he is. Twenty-three? Twenty-five? No, he looks all of a shocked and traumatized seventeen. 

He flinches back when you touch his arm again. You should know better than that by now. "No—" 

"It's still just me. It's okay." 

"No the fuck it's _not_, didn't—didn't you hear him, didn't he—" 

"He wasn't all that forthcoming with actual info." Well. "He said something about fire. You tried to walk into the fire." 

D sobs again at that, his hands closing into fists as he rubs hard at his eyes for a moment. Then he lets them drop back into his lap, eyes the color of red wine blinking at you for a moment. "I—" 

"Don't tell me you killed them, D. Whatever killed them, it wasn't you. I promise." 

"But—" He shudders, takes another breath, and closes his eyes again. "I fe—I feel magic better'n most. Not—not as strong as when I was a lil' kid, but still, big shit, when big shit's coming, I should have—" 

"D." 

"I didn't, I _didn't_ feel it coming, alright? He's _right_, even in a go—in a goddamn tunnel it takes a shitton of power to burn hot enough to leave that lil' of a body, I should have _known_—" 

"D, please." 

"I should have been the one in front, I take point, I _always_ take point—" 

Because you have trouble with learning from past experiences, you reach for D's shoulder again. The moment your fingers brush his shirt he cries out and jerks back, shifting his weight radically enough that the cot flips. 

His choice to deal with that by going limp on the floor half-under the frame and one of the pillows is...well, you can't say it's surprising. You've seen enough hunters struggling under the weight of guilt and loss that none of it really counts as surprising anymore. _Painful_ is a better word, you guess—for them, and for you. 

You pick the cot up off him and set it up a couple feet over to the right, trying not to think about how broken he sounds as he sobs there on the floor. He won't help you get him up this time, but it's not as far to go either—you can manage it, just barely. 

Oh, that's definitely going to hurt later. 

"D—" 

"No, please fucking god no, please—please, I—" 

"It's all right. We're done. It's over. I'm sorry." You are. You really are. You can handle the times when a hunter comes back beyond the help you can give—you've had more barely-not-children die clutching at your hand than you want to count. This is worse, sometimes—struggling to help the ones who couldn't save their friends or their family, and knowing that you're never going to be able to really fix them. Knowing that there's nothing you can do, other than lay the blanket over him, wait a moment until he clutches at the edge and pulls it half over his face, then step towards the door with the vague idea of finding someone who knows enough about the Striders to tell you if there's someone you can call other than his brother. 

Again, the house has other plans. The door opens not ino the hall but into a darker room, lit only by a tiny, dim light plugged into the outlet by the door. You blink a few times, and your eyes adjust just enough to see the shape of a boy frozen halfway through the act of climbing out of his bed. 

Dirk has _amazingly_ messy bedhead, you realize as he stares up at you. It's funny, almost, because he's ususally such a neat kid, more so than you'd expect from any seven year old. After a moment you also realize that staring back at him is probably much more intimidating than you need or want to be, and look away to check the other bed instead. 

Which is...empty. Damn it. "Where's Dave?" 

"Bro came 'n got him." Apparently Dirk takes the question as permission to slide the rest of the way to the floor, rubbing at his eyes for a moment before crossing his arms and glaring up at you with obvious and righteous suspicion. "Where's D?" 

"In the med room." You don't lie to kids unless it's absolutely necessary. Which it isn't. 

"What happened to him?" 

This is _not_ your job. Explaining the facts of life and death to children is one of the very few things you refuse to add to your job description. "He's not hurt, don't worry." 

Dirk knows that's bullshit. You're pretty sure that the look that crosses his face is a deliberate effort to make sure that _you_ know he knows. "Then how come Dave cried when Bro picked him up?" 

Oh that's not good. One more thing you don't like. "Uh...how about you come see D and I'll go find Dave?" 

"You're _really bad_ at not answering questions," Dirk informs you in that ultimately serious tone that only small children are capable of, but he does take your hand when you offer it, letting you guide him through the door. If he's surprised at which room it goes to he doesn't show it, just tugs his hand free as you shut the door, going over to poke at D's blanket-covered shoulder. "Bro?" 

It takes D a moment to react, for whatever reason. Maybe he fell asleep, maybe he just needs a second to process whose voice he's hearing—not that it matters. After that second's hesitation, D makes a sound that's caught between a whimper and a groan, rolling over to stare at Dirk. 

Then he shoves at the blanket enough to get his upper body free, opening his arms. That's all the prompting the boy needs to climb up onto the cot and settle there, tucked in against his guardian. 

You wait one more minute before you flick the main light off (leaving the room lit only a little better than Dirk and Dave's bedroom, by the screensaver on your computer instead of a nightlight) and step back out the door and into the hall. Time to find Bro and Dave...

* * *

You don't really manage that. Well, you guess you get half of it done—you find Dave abandoned on the couch in the main room, wrapped in a blanket someone else left there earlier and still hiccuping out sobs. Bro is nowhere to be seen, and this time the house refuses to give you any more help than it already has. 

Not that you really blame it. You'd never say it, but you don't like the man either. Dave, though—he's just a sweet little boy who does his best to stifle his tears when you pick him up and promise him you're taking to D, even if he won't let go of you once you do actually get back to your room. 

Again, you can't blame him any more than you can blame the house. D and Dirk are asleep; you don't want to wake them up either. By the time you get yourself settled in the chair in front of your computer, Dave's almost asleep too, head against your chest with both arms wrapped loosely around your neck. 

All right. That's fine. You doublecheck that your volume's muted, reach around the boy on your lap, and start typing. Might as well finish this so you can see what you need to order tomorrow.

* * *

D's—well, he's not fine the next morning. You know he's not fine, this isn't just something that can be brushed off like that, but he's covered up his emotional reaction well enough that you don't think anyone would ask him what was wrong. He spends a good hour and a half locked in the store room on his phone; you keep Dirk and Dave occupied despite the fact that Dirk very obviously does not quite trust someone who's as bad at you are at avoiding questions. 

Whatever kind of therapy session he gets over the phone seems to help, though—you can tell he's cried when he comes out, but he smiles when he scoops up first Dirk and then Dave for a kiss. Dirk seems pleased, Dave just seems anxious. 

"Bro's comin' back?" 

D's shoulders sag at the question, but just barely enough that you notice. "Yeah, man, don't worry. Give him some space, he'll be back." 

Dave nods like D's promise is law. Unfortunately, you believe D just as much as he does. 

Not that you'd ever say that either.


End file.
